O'Connors of Connacht

The O'Connors were one of the royal families of medieval Ireland that ruled Síl Muiredaig, roughly the modern county of Roscommon, in the province of Connacht in the northwest of Ireland. The family produced several high kings (most powerful kings) of Ireland in the twelfth century, and was originally descended from Conchobair, king of Connacht, who died in 973. Conchobair was of the line of the Uí Bruín Aí who originally controlled central Roscommon. By the eleventh century the O'Connors had successfully subdued the other major families of Connacht, notably the O'Flahertys, the O'Rourkes, and the Uí Bruín Bréifni. Contemporaneously, successive O'Connor kings also tried to rid themselves of the overlordship of the O'Brien high kings. This conflict was temporarily resolved when Turloch Mór O'Connor, with the active support of his maternal uncle, the high king Muirchertach O'Brien, was inaugurated as king over the Síl Muiredaig in 1106. Because of his powerful position he soon became provincial king of the whole of Connacht, and in about 1120 he replaced the O'Briens as high king with opposition.

Later in his reign, around 1150, he had to defer to the northern high king, Muirchertach Mac Lochlainn. But on Muirchertach's death in 1166, Turloch's son, Rory, who had succeeded him on his death in 1156, took control of the whole of Ireland. As high king, he presided over two national assemblies in 1167 and 1168, and on the advice of Ua Ruairc of Bréifne he also banished Dermot MacMurrough, king of Leinster, who fled to England to gain the support of King Henry II in his attempt to recover Leinster. This caused the Anglo-Norman invasion of Ireland after Dermot brought foreign troops back with him in 1167 and again in 1169. For more than two years Rory, with the support of his Norse allies, fought the army of Strongbow, who had landed in Ireland with at least two hundred knights in 1170. However, in 1171, Henry, worried by the success of his nobles in Ireland, came over to Ireland to stamp his authority on the island. At the Treaty of Windsor (1175) Rory submitted to Henry, who in return agreed to maintain Rory as king of Connacht and high king of Ireland over those parts of northern and western Ireland that had not yet been taken over by the Anglo-Normans. On Rory's death in 1198 his brother Cathal Crobderg O'Connor was able to hold all of Connacht by a royal charter, and he also maintained good relations with the Dublin government of the English Crown.

SEE ALSO Dál Cais and Brian Boru; Uí Néill High Kings

Bibliography

Byrne, F. J. Irish Kings and High-Kings. 2d edition, 2001.

Orpen, G. H. Ireland under the Normans. 4 vols. 1911–1920.

Simms, K. From Kings to Warlords. 2000.

Terry Barry